WhatsApp surpassed by the impressive new update of Apple’s iMessage

WhatsApp, the world’s leading messenger with 2 billion users sending 100 billion messages a day, popularized the secure messaging system. But if you are one of the hundreds of millions who use WhatsApp on an iPhone, you will be in for an undesirable surprise to see Apple’s new iMessage update.

WhatsApp used to be all about security. “Privacy and security are in our DNA,” he says, and takes credit for delivering encrypted message privacy to the masses. But data security is complex – take a look at the complex patterns on an investigator’s desktop and you’ll understand: sometimes it’s not what we say that matters, it’s when, where and who.

“Metadata – data about your data,” says Cyjax CISO Ian Thornton-Trump, “are almost as powerful as the real data. “Who do you know, who do you send messages to, when and how often. Who do they know and messages to. What other activity can be tracked for your user ID. These are the metadata that drive Facebook’s information mining machine And that is why there has been so much nervousness around his plans for WhatsApp, as it drives monetization for all these users and integrates it with its other platforms.

Concerns about WhatsApp metadata collection are not new. Take a look at your privacy policy and you will see the scale of data you collect. “We use all the information we have to help us operate, provide, improve, understand, personalize, support and market our services,” he says, adding, “We share your information to help us operate, provide, improve, understand, customize, support and market our services. “

And then there’s the Facebook factor. “As part of the Facebook family of companies,” says the privacy policy, “WhatsApp receives and shares information with this family of companies. We may use the information we receive from them, and they may use the information we share with them to help operate, provide, improve, understand, personalize, support and market our services and offerings. “

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And while its end-to-end encrypted content cannot be accessed, “your WhatsApp messages will not be shared on Facebook for others to see,” he confirms that this metadata exists. “Facebook can use our information to improve your experience on its services, such as making product suggestions (for example, from friends or connections, or interesting content) and showing relevant offers and ads.”

Cue Apple and its campaign to curb Facebook’s insatiable appetite for user data. Much of this was discussed last summer. As my colleague Kate O’Flaherty explained at the time, this is a real “game changer” for user privacy – cutting off the tracking IDs and location mapping trusted by advertisers. Tracking and cross-referencing browsing and social media activity is one thing, but what you do within the confines of apps is different – then you’re a captive audience. And the reason that there is now a messaging war for users is that these are the most persistent applications.

If I can link you to multiple applications through your personal identifiers, your phone number or device ID, for example, I can link your metadata to everything else I know. As WhatsApp says, its metadata “includes information about your activity … specific device information … like hardware model, operating system information, browser information, IP address, mobile network information, including phone number and device identifiers … We receive information provided by others from us, which may include information about you. For example, when other users you know use our services, they can provide your phone number from your mobile address book (just as you can provide theirs) or they can send a message to you, send messages to groups to which you belong or call you. “

You understood. Apple’s impressive response to this metadata collection trend has been its privacy labels, now available on the App Store. “On each product’s product page,” explains Apple, “users can learn about some of the types of data an application can collect and whether that data is linked to or used to track it.” These labels were launched last month and caused a furor between Apple and the application developers whose data collection practices were now heavily exposed. Facebook led this attack, showing full-page ads to argue against Apple’s decision.

The problem with WhatsApp is that when you say that security and privacy are in your DNA, you open yourself up to a higher level of scrutiny. Suddenly, concerns about WhatsApp’s metadata collection became more real. Now we can easily see that WhatsApp collects contacts on your phone, business data where you use Facebook services, device-based identifiers, your IP address that provides your location, unless you are using a VPN, and your records use. All connected to you.

WhatsApp issued a statement in response to Apple’s privacy labels. “We must collect some information to provide a reliable global communication service,” he said, “in principle, we minimize the categories of data we collect … we take steps to restrict access to that information. For example, although you can grant us access to your contacts to help deliver the messages you send, we do not share contact lists with anyone, including Facebook for your own use. “

WhatsApp was particularly wiped out for what it considered inconsistency on the part of Apple, telling Axios that “the labels must be consistent across its own and third-party applications, as well as reflecting the strong measures that applications can take to protect people’s private information – while providing reading information is a good start, we believe it is important that people can compare these ‘privacy nutrition’ labels of apps they download with apps that come pre-installed, like iMessage. ”

In a very clear example of being careful about what you want, Apple has updated its website and the same level of privacy information as iMessage is now available, presenting an impressive contrast between iMessage and WhatsApp.

Meanwhile all WhatsApp metadata is classified as “data linked to you”, the only iMessage metadata linked to a user’s identity is their email address, phone number, device ID and search history. According to Apple, “data linked to you” means that “data is collected in a way that is linked to your identity, such as your account, your device or your details – to declare that the data is collected, but not linked to you , a developer must use privacy protections, such as removing any direct identifiers. “

In simple terms, all additional data that iMessage collects to monitor its platform and usage cannot be linked to individuals, whereas with WhatsApp everything is linked back.

How you feel about WhatsApp data collection will depend on your personal view of data privacy. Whatever it is, think about the changes that will occur in WhatsApp, especially in relation to business messages and purchases, as well as closer integration with Messenger and Instagram – although this is likely to be delayed by the antitrust action against Facebook that just set off in the USA

WhatsApp is reportedly concerned that users will not endeavor to check the iMessage privacy label, since it is pre-installed. I think their concern should be that users go do just that. And while iMessage is better, it is far from the leader of the class, Signal, which has only one metadata item – its own phone number – and even though “it is not linked to your identity”. As for Facebook Messenger – I have repeatedly advised users to switch to an alternative.

Congratulations to Apple for these privacy labels, it’s a big step forward against permission abuse, where apps take our data for no good reason. And if you are an Android user, the situation is much worse. Permission abuse is much more common in the Android ecosystem, despite Android 11 finally starting to do something about it.

WhatsApp security is perfectly sufficient for almost all users. But metadata is a gray area, and as we do more and more on these messaging platforms, its value will increase. These are your data and you have the right to ask why they are being collected and processed. If you believe that your data should not be collected without good reason, you now have the tools to compare the alternatives.